The other problem, which pretty much woke me up last night, was our old friend Mr. Differential Expansion. The glass globes are fragile, and were a tiny bit smaller than my “first article” that I based dimensions on. My acrylic inserts set on the tanks and go up into the globes. These interface pieces were line-to-line with the globe ID’s. I actually had to grind the glass and/or the acrylic to make them fit.
I realized… like at 3 am, yay… that one day the temps would go up or down quickly, and the acrylic disks would win. 16 glass bombs would go off, and I’d have a glass shard laden garden (sharden?) layout.
After I got up, I yanked one of the inserts and tried to get its upper plate off. I used a flat-blade xacto and a hammer, but it finally split away, which was a relief, because I wanted to save the lower disk and gasket.
So right after work I did the same to all the inserts. Hard to explain, but basically I separated and discarded the disk circled in red, and the gasket strip around it. To the right are the salvaged bare lower disks, which have thick gaskets adhered beneath them.
While that was happening, I recut (lasered) the upper disks but with a smaller OD. Then re-glued, re-gasketed, and reassembled all the lanterns.
I’d post a pic of that, but it’s identical to those from yesterday.
Sometimes tough fixes go completely unseen… And this is in that category. But I figure I’d post about this meaningless effort here to make it seen by someone besides me, and if you’re patient enough to read this, that’s YOU. So thanks!!